Busing migrants to deep blue cities is working. There's a reason why Dems are to blame for Biden's border mess

Editor's note: The following column first appeared in The Daily Signal. 

Republican border-state strategy to send illegal immigrants to Democrat-run cities and states is paying off.

Last Thursday, New York Gov. Kathy Hochul sent a letter to President Joe Biden begging for federal aid. Importantly, she finally acknowledged where the problem is coming from.

"This is a financial burden the city and state are shouldering on behalf of the federal government," Hochul, a fellow Democrat, said of the illegal immigrants pouring into New York.

"I cannot ask New Yorkers to pay for what is fundamentally a federal responsibility," the governor wrote. "And I urge the federal government to take prompt and significant action today to meet its obligation to New York State."

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In a press conference following the release of the letter, Hochul further complained about illegal immigrants released into the country by the Biden administration.

What happened to all are welcome, no exceptions?

This is an interesting pivot from the New York governor. Until now, Democratic politicians mostly have been unwilling to criticize the White House in any way on the border security issue, or even suggest that the Biden administration is where the problem originates.

If you want to know the reason for the sudden pivot, a new poll sheds light. The Siena College poll released earlier this month shows that New Yorkers are deeply discontented about the surge of illegal immigrants in their state and mostly blame Democrat leaders.

"New Yorkers—including huge majorities of Democrats, Republicans, independents, upstaters and downstaters—overwhelmingly say that the recent influx of migrants to New York is a serious problem for the state," Siena College pollster Steven Greenberg said.

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Now, this may seem meaningless in the sense that New York is unlikely to become a red state any time soon. But keep in mind that the crime issue didn’t just swing seats from Democrat to Republican in the 2022 midterm elections, it likely also gave the GOP overall control of the U.S. House of Representatives.

Discontent over lawless Democrat policies is much worse now, and New York voters are heaping the blame on Hochul, New York City Mayor Eric Adams, and, most of all, Biden.

Open borders and the idea that all immigration—whether legal or illegal—is a positive good is a matter of faith for Democrat Party activists. That’s less likely to be true with rank-and-file voters and independents.

"There is no question in my mind that the politics of this is a disaster to Democrats," said Howard Wolfson, a former deputy and political adviser to former New York Mayor Michael Bloomberg, in an interview with The New York Times.

"This issue alone has the potential to cost Democrats the House, because it is such a huge issue in New York City and the coverage of it is clearly heard and seen by voters in all of these swing districts in the suburbs," Wolfson said.

He described the issue as a "ticking time bomb" for Democrats.

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I’d say the bomb already has gone off.

Since Biden entered the White House in January 2021, a historic stream of illegal immigrants has poured across the U.S. southern border. This has had catastrophic consequences for many swamped communities in Texas and Arizona especially. They’ve shouldered the burden of the border crisis for years, so it’s a little rich for New York to be throwing a pity party.

It obviously would be better if the federal government was doing its job and enforcing our laws, but until that time there’s little border states can do to "fix" the situation. All they can do is mitigate the damage.

The Biden administration has done all it can to make sure that the border remains nice and open, er, "secure."

The administration’s actions have made it clear that Biden and his top officials want to flood the country with illegal immigrants.

And that’s where border-state busing comes in.

Instead of carrying the entire burden of the Biden-led border disaster, Republican governors such as Greg Abbott in Texas, Ron DeSantis in Florida, and Doug Ducey in Arizona decided to ship illegal immigrants to places such as Chicago, New York, the District of Columbia, and, most amusingly, Martha’s Vineyard.

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This is hardly ideal. But if the federal government is going to foist open borders on the country, why not at least force the people who voted for this nonsense to pay more of the price for it?

Of course, Democrats in those destinations pointed fingers at the Republican governors for their newfound troubles, and some left-wing political commentators tried to say that shipping illegal immigrants to Martha’s Vineyard—a posh, liberal vacation destination—was akin to Nazism.

Biden’s trusty allies in the legacy media have done all they can to "contextualize" the immigration issue to protect the president from criticism.

However, much like with the crime surge, it’s hard to pull the wool over the eyes of the American people forever when they literally see the consequences of bad policies in their neighborhoods.

Thanks to Biden, the bill for once low-cost, sanctuary-city virtue signaling has come due.

I suggest that if Democrat politicians want federal aid to care for illegal immigrants, they should demand that the White House work to restore the policies of the previous administration and actually attempt to get control of the border.

The excuses have run out, the border crisis has become a national crisis, and blame for this mess falls on the "big guy" in the Oval Office.

Democrats’ demands for more money should be met with a resounding "no" until the actual problem is fixed at its source.